Emily Hendrickson (3 page)

It was then she discovered the identity of her victim. “Lord Leighton! Oh, jiminy!”

Elizabeth dropped to the floor, heedless of the impropriety of her dress or her isolation with the man she’d assiduously avoided. Blood seeped from the wound on his arm, and he looked to be in frightful pain. “Confound it,” she murmured as she rolled his lordship over to better examine the damage. What a pickle!

“All I wanted was a chance to talk with you,” Leighton protested, his words slurred, to the apparition in snowy white who hovered over him like an angel of mercy. She missed the appreciative gleam that sparkled in his eyes as he viewed the sheer cambric-veiled figure of the well-endowed Miss Dancy.

“You might have presented yourself in the drawing room, sirrah,” Elizabeth snapped, albeit quietly. She could scarcely miss the alcoholic fumes that emanated from his lordship. The man was foxed!

“And be informed you were not at home? You have avoided me at every turn.” He winced when she tugged the sleeve of his coat, pulling it from him with none-too-gentle jerks. “That hurts,” he complained.

“And so it should. You have been shot,” she reminded him, quite unpitying in her care, “And you are most improper, creeping like this into the bedroom of a young woman.”

Then she remembered that this room had belonged to Hyacinth until this evening. Her heart felt crushed as she considered the implications of that, even as she sought a pad with which to staunch his bleeding.

The door new open and her aunt charged into the room, a poker in hand, her dressing gown flying about her. At the scene before her, she halted abruptly. “What’s this?”

“It was an accident, ma’am,” Elizabeth said, trying to figure out how she and Lord Leighton might extricate themselves from what she was rapidly coming to see might be a very tricky situation.

Her aunt consulted the mantel clock. “After midnight! ‘Tis Valentine’s Day! You have just shot your future husband, my dear girl!”

Chapter Two

Pandemonium broke loose.

A wide-eyed Chloe peeped around the door, Hyacinth right behind her, both arrayed in voluminous white night-robes with dainty caps tied neatly under their chins.

They were quickly followed by Gibbons, Aunt Bel’s odd butler, clad in an awesome plaid flannel robe of generous proportions, and the first footman, James, attired in a hastily donned shirt and breeches. The latter two properly kept their curiosity under control.

Elizabeth threw Gibbons a wild glance, wondering if he would rise to the occasion. “Do find a doctor, or at the very least someone who knows more about medicine than I do.”

“Here, here,” murmured the injured Leighton. He shifted his position and placed his head on Elizabeth’s lap. When she sent him a startled look, the one she received in return was limpid with innocence. “I am in great pain,” he added sadly, then winced as she moved.

Elizabeth spared him a dark glance that told what she thought about his uttering a word one way or the other.

Before the plump, absentminded Gibbons could act, he was thrust aside by Purvis, Aunt Bel’s formidable abigail. Her flowered chintz robe wound snugly about her spare frame, tied in place with a no-nonsense belt, and a lone braid of an odd shade of gray hung over one shoulder. Her nightcap was a prim muslin, with the barest frill, and tied precisely beneath her chin. She carried a neat basket from which she began to extract various dreadful-looking objects.

“All of you, out!” she declared in a brisk voice, seeming pleased to be in command. She placed a restraining hand on Elizabeth’s arm, adding, “Except you. You have sense.” From Purvis, that was high praise.

The onlookers, disappointed that they had to wait for explanations, drifted away from the scene to confer in soft accents down the hall.

Feeling sorry for Lord Leighton, even if he had entered her room in a havey-cavey manner, Elizabeth deftly eased him from her lap, ignoring the look of reproach he bestowed on her. She tucked a pillow beneath his head, wondering aloud, “Would it not be better to place him on the bed?”

Purvis surveyed that piece of furniture, then nodded. “He ought to be able to manage that distance, surely.”

The patient made an inarticulate sound that both women ignored.

“Up with you,” Purvis said to the unfortunate fellow, then firmly guided him to the bed with Elizabeth on his other side.

His right arm curved around her slim shoulders and pulled Elizabeth extremely close to his side. She considered giving him a sharp set-down, then chided herself for that unkind thought. The poor man could scarcely behave in an unseemly manner when he was in such pain, much less have amorous notions. As though to emphasize this, he groaned when Purvis nudged him against the edge of the bed. Elizabeth felt his body slump against her as Purvis threw back the covers. Those strange stirrings deep within her began to flicker again, and she ruthlessly thrust them aside, wondering how on earth she could feel like this at such a moment.

Instead she slipped her arms about him to offer support, pressing her slim body against his side to keep him from toppling over. To compensate for shooting the man, she tenderly helped him stretch out, noting how tall he was, how broad were his shoulders with his coat tossed aside. No padding needed in his coats.

With a speaking glance, Purvis thrust a robe into Elizabeth’s hands. Impatiently she donned it, then returned to her duties.

Tucking her very own down pillow under his head, she then assisted Purvis in cutting away the left sleeve of his shirt, firmly nudging away any reactions to all that bare flesh. A young lady was rarely exposed to naked limbs.

With surprising skill Purvis set about examining the wound. She barked out an order for brandy, insisting Lord Leighton needed it. Elizabeth went to fetch it, glad to be away from the sight of all that blood for a moment. Wonder of wonders, James stood outside the door with a decanter of the late Lord Montmorcy’s best on a tray. It took but moments to pour a glass for Lord Leighton, not that she felt he needed one.

Leighton drank deeply, then gave Purvis a grin. “Do your best,” he said, his voice oddly faint to Elizabeth’s ears, which made her feel even more wretched. She averted her eyes from the sight of Purvis cleaning the wound.

In the twinkling of a bedpost, Purvis completed her examination. Her self-satisfied grunt brought Elizabeth’s gaze back to her. As though in response to an unasked question, Purvis glanced up to meet her eyes. “My previous mistress had a husband who liked to duel.”

Elizabeth considered that statement in silence, assisting Purvis with what she required, while avoiding the sight of his injury. Taking the water pitcher from the dresser, she poured some of the cool liquid into a bowl. Then soft cloths, jars, and bottles were extracted from the depths of the basket, to be used and replaced in order.

When Elizabeth risked a glance at their patient, she met his eyes. His low moan of pain tore at her heart and she looked away.

The sight of all the bloody water and the stained cloths turned Elizabeth’s stomach, and she felt utterly miserable. When he looked at her, she could have wept with vexation, for his gaze held no reproach, only appeal.

At last, Elizabeth surveyed the bandaged man who occupied her bed. That dark hair flopped in a frightfully endearing manner over his pale brow. She succumbed to the temptation to brush it off his forehead. To her consternation, she found her eyes caught in his steady gaze.

“I am sorry, sir. Never mind that you did ask for trouble, entering the house like that.” She folded up the last of the bloodied cloths, placing it atop the stack.

Purvis gave a snort, adding, “Young men will do strange things around St. Valentine’s Day, won’t they?” She tidied the table and bed, then surveyed her patient.

“I doubt that had a thing to do with this nocturnal call, however,” Elizabeth said in reply. Worry flooded her being as she continued to look at the silent man on her bed. “I shall sit up with him for what remains of the night. After all, it is my fault he is wounded.” Her eyes added the rider that he would not be in her bed if he had gone about the call in a proper manner.

Aunt Bel materialized at her side, studying Lord Leighton with shrewd eyes. “I believe that would be permissible. You are betrothed as far as I am concerned.” To his lordship she added, “You have fulfilled my vision, sir, but you might have arrived at a more proper hour.”

She motioned James to her side, then watched as he removed Leighton’s boots and settled the man more comfortably. Ignoring Elizabeth’s sputtering, Lady Montmorcy organized the room, seeing that her niece had all she needed, then retired.

Once alone, Elizabeth met Lord Leighton’s drowsy gaze with trepidation. Swallowing with care, she said, “We are not, you know. She fancies the notion tonight.” She spared a glance at the mantel clock, then continued, “I shall convince her later that it is all a hum.”

She paused by the side of the bed and admonished him, “What an exceedingly foolish thing to do, to be sure.”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time. After all, Romeo tried it,” he murmured groggily. “Didn’t expect a gun.”

“What with all that went on while I was in London, with those intruders, I find I have peace of mind with it under my pillow.”

“I see.”

“Besides,
I
was not the person you intended to see this night,” Elizabeth observed primly, annoyed at the feeling of ill-usage that grew within her.

“And who did I plan to see?” he inquired.

“This was Hyacinth’s room until this evening. She is the woman you aimed to call upon.”

“Rubbish.” He stirred, then groaned. His sigh and look of reproach brought Elizabeth to his side with a cloth wrung out in cool water. She gently wiped his brow, then offered him a drink of water.

“Hush, now. We can discuss this in the morning. You are in no condition to make sense of anything at the moment.”

She watched with a kind of satisfaction as the potion Purvis had given Lord Leighton took effect. Those absurdly long lashes drifted down over ashen cheeks, and in minutes he slept.

Three of the clock, and bitterly cold out. She wrapped the robe Purvis had fetched her more tightly about her, then strolled to the fireplace. She placed another scoop of coal on the fire, stirring the blaze absently. The flames leaped higher, and she relished the warmth. The French windows were now shut tightly, and shut they would remain. She wanted no chill to injure his lordship.

Turning, she studied the man in her bed. He looked different now as he slept beneath the prim white covers. Innocent. Vulnerable. Odd, she had never associated those words with the rake she considered him to be. While in London he had teased her unmercifully, or at least, she amended in all fairness, he had teased her with the good-natured toleration of an older brother.

He had driven her quite mad with all those taunting glances, the words meant to mock her. And as for those kisses he had stolen while at the Fenwick’s ball, well!

And now he sought her dear cousin, Hyacinth. Regardless of his protests, she knew better. He must have bribed one of the maids to reveal the location of her cousin’s room. Hyacinth, with her glorious red hair and green eyes and flawless skin—but for two or three freckles that only added to her appeal.

What would happen later this day at the ball? Elizabeth wondered suddenly. She could scarcely attend, with a wounded man in her bedroom, a man
she
had injured. If word of this reached the local society, tongues would flap like a flag in a stiff” breeze. At least her sister Victoria was still abroad and Julia off in the country.

What her brother Geoffrey might say didn’t matter. As far as she knew, he still remained on the continent with Wellington. Her thoughts turned to where he served.

Elizabeth doubted for a minute that the peace negotiations with Napoleon at Chatillon would prove fruitful. She didn’t trust the Corsican one bit, and hoped those who dealt with his generals didn’t either. But Lord Castlereigh was no fool, and likely to see through any ruse the French might think up.

As to the rumors abounding that Napoleon was dead, Elizabeth doubted those as well. It would be too convenient for so evil a man to simply die just like that.

Leighton stirred, and Elizabeth immediately forgot her gloomy contemplations to check on him. He was slightly warm, but not alarmingly so. She wrung out the cloth and set to cooling his brow.

And so the hours passed with Elizabeth soothing his brow, keeping close watch over her rake.

When Purvis briskly entered the room to inspect her patient, she gave Elizabeth a grim smile of approval. “I told her ladyship you’d do just fine as a nurse, and so you did. You’ve learned well. She has decided he must be moved across the hall to the blue room. James is coming up, and we shall effect the transfer shortly.”

A dismayed Elizabeth gave Lord Leighton a concerned look, wondering how he would stand such a move.

“It is not seemly that he be here in what is, after all, your room. The other is ready for him. Ah, here is James now.” Purvis turned to greet him, giving softly voiced instructions that apparently met with his approval.

When Elizabeth glanced at the figure on her bed again, she met his bemused gaze with a fluttering heartbeat. Those eyes had such power to disturb her, even when he was half asleep. Aware he had needs that could not be cared for by herself, she greeted the news that his valet would be sent for with great relief.

“Until he arrives, James will stand as attendant for his lordship,” Purvis declared.

With that bit of information. Lord Leighton was eased from the bed and assisted out of Elizabeth’s bedroom and across the hall. It was not far, but she could see he leaned heavily against James as they shuffled to the blue room. How odd that such a small wound should be so utterly debilitating.

The door closed behind the men, and Elizabeth stood uncertainly in her doorway, feeling somewhat foolish to be seen staring at the slab of wood, yet unable to move.

The rustle of skirts roused her from her abstraction. Chloe and Hyacinth descended upon her with soft exclamations of concern, and unconcealed curiosity.